| By Kay Steiger - Dec 13th, 2007 at 3:08 am EST |
| Also listed in: Campus Progress Blog |
I was horrified when I recently saw a weird debate on the blogs that was pretty much boiled down to: Black people don't have as high IQ scores as white people. Does that mean they're just dumber? Thank goodness for Amanda Marcotte. Finally, she (and Malcom Gladwell through a recent book review) brought some sanity to this debate.
It’s quite timely now that the racists are trotting out their favorite theory that gets trotted out every few years, smacked down, and then trotted out again once they figure everyone has forgotten the last smackdown, the theory that the IQ gap between whites and blacks must reflect fundamental, immutable, genetic traits, ergo a racist caste system is organic and not the product of oppression.
Now, she's finally making the point I'd been hoping someone would make all along: No, black people aren't dumber. The tests and social standards are biased in a certain way.The fact that the IQ test has long been billed as "a measure of raw intelligence" just seemed silly to me. Gladwell does a great job of explaining why:
The psychologist Michael Cole and some colleagues once gave members of the Kpelle tribe, in Liberia, a version of the WISC similarities test: they took a basket of food, tools, containers, and clothing and asked the tribesmen to sort them into appropriate categories. To the frustration of the researchers, the Kpelle chose functional pairings. They put a potato and a knife together because a knife is used to cut a potato. “A wise man could only do such-and-such,” they explained. Finally, the researchers asked, “How would a fool do it?” The tribesmen immediately re-sorted the items into the “right” categories. It can be argued that taxonomical categories are a developmental improvement—that is, that the Kpelle would be more likely to advance, technologically and scientifically, if they started to see the world that way. But to label them less intelligent than Westerners, on the basis of their performance on that test, is merely to state that they have different cognitive preferences and habits.
I once got criticized for suggesting that maybe the SAT was biased toward white people because non-white groups were lagging behind. What this really shows me is that intelligence, as we tend to measure it, has a lot more to do with class and buying into a certain set of social standards and assumptions. Of course it's hard to think that maybe the way you view the world is really specific to how you were raised. Realizing that is the easy part. Breaking down biases in supposedly objective data is the hard part.
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""I once got criticized for suggesting that maybe the SAT was biased toward white people because non-white groups were lagging behind.""
Way to completely misrepresent the criticism of your absurd position that we're teaching "too white".
Also, linking between the SAT and overall intelligence is silly (This ties into the reasons why Saletan is wrong on this issue). A test that allowed the Kpelle to score highly would be pointless to administer anywhere in the developed world, because it wouldn't reward the thought processes that bring success in modernity.
There's nothing much wrong with what the SAT measures, in the sense that the skills it measures (taken in the broad sense) are directly relevant to modern success.
What this really gets into is the bullshit doctrine of 'post-modernity' implicit in a lot of these arguments -- the idea that modernity is a passe fictional construction, with no verifiable use, and that you can't measure the 'usefulness' of much of anything in quantifiable, valid-worldwide terms.
In other words, much of the underlying logic of your argument regarding the SAT lends itself to arguments that negate pillars of liberalism such as womens' rights, the right of blasphemy, the right of consensual sexual activity, etc.
""Of course it's hard to think that maybe the way you view the world is really specific to how you were raised. Realizing that is the easy part. Breaking down biases in supposedly objective data is the hard part.""
How brave of you, to cast yourself as the enlightened one!
...Now, regarding Saletan: If I were going to construct an imaginary study to disprove his argument, I'd go with this -- compare Black, East Asian, Latino, and White kids from equivalent socio-economic backgrounds, from the same region, all of whom are at least third-generation American, all of whom are from a two-married-parent nuclear family, and all of whom (and this last one is an important factor that isn't given its due in these studies) who are all getting *roughly equally laid*. (See the recent season finale South Park episode, 'The List', for a cute, simple explanation of why this matters)
I have a really hard time believing you'd get a significant divergence, based on race, with these factors controlled for.
""I once got criticized for suggesting that maybe the SAT was biased toward white people because non-white groups were lagging behind.""
Way to completely misrepresent the criticism of your absurd position that we're teaching "too white".
Also, linking between the SAT and overall intelligence is silly (This ties into the reasons why Saletan is wrong on this issue). A test that allowed the Kpelle to score highly would be pointless to administer anywhere in the developed world, because it wouldn't reward the thought processes that bring success in modernity.
There's nothing much wrong with what the SAT measures, in the sense that the skills it measures (taken in the broad sense) are directly relevant to modern success.
What this really gets into is the bullshit doctrine of 'post-modernity' implicit in a lot of these arguments -- the idea that modernity is a passe fictional construction, with no verifiable use, and that you can't measure the 'usefulness' of much of anything in quantifiable, valid-worldwide terms.
In other words, much of the underlying logic of your argument regarding the SAT lends itself to arguments that negate pillars of liberalism such as womens' rights, the right of blasphemy, the right of consensual sexual activity, etc.
""Of course it's hard to think that maybe the way you view the world is really specific to how you were raised. Realizing that is the easy part. Breaking down biases in supposedly objective data is the hard part.""
How brave of you, to cast yourself as the enlightened one!
...Now, regarding Saletan: If I were going to construct an imaginary study to disprove his argument, I'd go with this -- compare Black, East Asian, Latino, and White kids from equivalent socio-economic backgrounds, from the same region, all of whom are at least third-generation American, all of whom are from a two-married-parent nuclear family, and all of whom (and this last one is an important factor that isn't given its due in these studies) who are all getting *roughly equally laid*. (See the recent season finale South Park episode, 'The List', for a cute, simple explanation of why this matters)
I have a really hard time believing you'd get a significant divergence, based on race, with these factors controlled for.
""I once got criticized for suggesting that maybe the SAT was biased toward white people because non-white groups were lagging behind.""
Way to completely misrepresent the criticism of your absurd position that we're teaching "too white".
Also, linking between the SAT and overall intelligence is silly (This ties into the reasons why Saletan is wrong on this issue). A test that allowed the Kpelle to score highly would be pointless to administer anywhere in the developed world, because it wouldn't reward the thought processes that bring success in modernity.
There's nothing much wrong with what the SAT measures, in the sense that the skills it measures (taken in the broad sense) are directly relevant to modern success.
What this really gets into is the bullshit doctrine of 'post-modernity' implicit in a lot of these arguments -- the idea that modernity is a passe fictional construction, with no verifiable use, and that you can't measure the 'usefulness' of much of anything in quantifiable, valid-worldwide terms.
In other words, much of the underlying logic of your argument regarding the SAT lends itself to arguments that negate pillars of liberalism such as womens' rights, the right of blasphemy, the right of consensual sexual activity, etc.
""Of course it's hard to think that maybe the way you view the world is really specific to how you were raised. Realizing that is the easy part. Breaking down biases in supposedly objective data is the hard part.""
How brave of you, to cast yourself as the enlightened one!
...Now, regarding Saletan: If I were going to construct an imaginary study to disprove his argument, I'd go with this -- compare Black, East Asian, Latino, and White kids from equivalent socio-economic backgrounds, from the same region, all of whom are at least third-generation American, all of whom are from a two-married-parent nuclear family, and all of whom (and this last one is an important factor that isn't given its due in these studies) who are all getting *roughly equally laid*. (See the recent season finale South Park episode, 'The List', for a cute, simple explanation of why this matters)
I have a really hard time believing you'd get a significant divergence, based on race, with these factors controlled for.